Bay Ridge Branch
Encyclopedia
Long Island Rail Road
The Long Island Rail Road or LIRR is a commuter rail system serving the length of Long Island, New York. It is the busiest commuter railroad in North America, serving about 81.5 million passengers each year. Established in 1834 and having operated continuously since then, it is the oldest US...
and operated by the New York and Atlantic Railway
New York and Atlantic Railway
The New York and Atlantic Railway is a short line railroad formed in 1997 to provide freight service over the tracks of the Long Island Rail Road, a public commuter rail agency which had decided to privatize its freight operations...
in the U.S. State
U.S. state
A U.S. state is any one of the 50 federated states of the United States of America that share sovereignty with the federal government. Because of this shared sovereignty, an American is a citizen both of the federal entity and of his or her state of domicile. Four states use the official title of...
of New York. It is the longest freight-only line of the LIRR, connecting the Montauk Branch
Montauk Branch
The Montauk Branch is a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in the U.S. state of New York. The branch runs the length of Long Island, 115 miles from Long Island City on the west to Montauk on the east...
and CSX Transportation
CSX Transportation
CSX Transportation operates a Class I railroad in the United States known as the CSX Railroad. It is the main subsidiary of the CSX Corporation. The company is headquartered in Jacksonville, Florida, and owns approximately 21,000 route miles...
's Fremont Secondary (to the Hell Gate Bridge
Hell Gate Bridge
The Hell Gate Bridge or Hell's Gate Bridge is a steel through arch railroad bridge between Astoria in the borough of Queens and Randall's and Wards Islands in New York City, over a portion of the East River known...
) at Glendale with the Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay
Upper New York Bay, or Upper Bay, is the traditional heart of the Port of New York and New Jersey, and often called New York Harbor. It is enclosed by the New York City boroughs of Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Staten Island and the Hudson County, New Jersey municipalities of Jersey City and Bayonne.It...
at Bay Ridge.
Car float
Car float
A railroad car float or rail barge is an unpowered barge with rail tracks mounted on its deck. It is used to move railroad cars across water obstacles, or to locations they could not otherwise go, and is pushed by a towboat or towed by a tugboat...
service provided by New York New Jersey Rail (formerly the New York Cross Harbor Railroad
New York Cross Harbor Railroad
New York New Jersey Rail, LLC is a switching and terminal railroad that operates the only car float operation across New York Harbor between Jersey City, New Jersey and Brooklyn, New York...
) is proposed to operate between Greenville Yard at Greenville, New Jersey and the LIRR / NY&A Bay Ridge 65th Street Yard. Currently the only car float service route is provided by New York New Jersey Rail between Greenville, NJ and Bush Terminal, Brooklyn.
A proposed Cross-Harbor Rail Tunnel
Cross-Harbor Rail Tunnel
The Cross-Harbor Rail Tunnel is a proposed freight rail transport tunnel under Upper New York Bay in the Port of New York and New Jersey between northeastern New Jersey and Long Island, including southern and eastern New York City.-Background:Direct connections for rail freight between Long Island...
from New Jersey to Brooklyn would use the Bay Ridge Branch to reach the rest of Long Island, with the line upgraded to double-stack clearances.
History
The first part of the line was opened by the New York, Bay Ridge and Jamaica Railroad in 1876, from Bay Ridge to the crossing of the Brooklyn, Bath and Coney Island Railroad near New Utrecht. An extension from New Utrecht east and northeast to New Lots opened in 1877, and at the same time the New York and Manhattan Beach Railway opened the line from New Lots north to East New York. An extension north from East New York to Cooper Avenue (and then northwest to Greenpoint, later the Evergreen Branch) opened in 1878, and the Long Island City and Manhattan Beach Railroad (incorporated February 24, 1883, merged with the New York and Manhattan Beach and New York, Bay Ridge and Jamaica into the New York, Brooklyn and Manhattan Beach Railway August 27, 1885) built from Cooper Avenue north to the Montauk BranchMontauk Branch
The Montauk Branch is a rail line owned and operated by the Long Island Rail Road in the U.S. state of New York. The branch runs the length of Long Island, 115 miles from Long Island City on the west to Montauk on the east...
at Glendale in 1883.
New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad
The New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad , was a railroad that operated in the northeast United States from 1872 to 1968 which served the states of Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts...
freight trains coming off the New York Connecting Railroad
New York Connecting Railroad
The New York Connecting Railroad or NYCR is a rail line in the borough of Queens in New York City. It links New York City and Long Island by rail directly to the North American mainland. Amtrak, CSX, Canadian Pacific Railway, Providence and Worcester Railroad and New York and Atlantic Railway...
(Hell Gate Bridge
Hell Gate Bridge
The Hell Gate Bridge or Hell's Gate Bridge is a steel through arch railroad bridge between Astoria in the borough of Queens and Randall's and Wards Islands in New York City, over a portion of the East River known...
). Electric operation ended on December 31, 1968.
Stations
The following passenger stations once existed on the line:- Bay Ridge
- Third Avenue
- Brooklyn, Bath and Coney Island Railroad Crossing
- Parkville
- Manhattan Beach Junction
- Kings County Central Junction
- Vanderveer Park, originally Flatlands
- Kouwenhoven
- Rugby, originally Ford's Corners
- New Lots Road
- East New YorkEast New York (LIRR station)East New York is a station on the Long Island Rail Road's Atlantic Branch in East New York, Brooklyn, where that branch passes through the historic Jamaica Pass. It is located at ground level, in the median of Atlantic Avenue, and underneath the elevated main lanes of Atlantic Avenue, with one side...
- Bushwick Avenue, originally Central Avenue
- Cypress Avenue, originally Dummy Crossing, then RidgewoodRidgewood, QueensRidgewood is a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens. It borders the neighborhoods of Maspeth, Middle Village and Glendale, as well as the Brooklyn neighborhood of Bushwick. Historically, the neighborhood straddled the Queens-Brooklyn boundary. The neighborhood is part of Queens...
- Myrtle Avenue
- Bushwick Junction, originally Fresh PondFresh Pond, QueensFresh Pond is a small neighborhood in Queens separated from Juniper Valley by the Lutheran and Mount Olivet cemeteries. Its main streets, Fresh Pond Road, Metropolitan Avenue, Eliot Avenue and 61st street, meet at the community's commercial center...
Proposed transit link
In light of residential growth and industrial decline, the Bay Ridge Branch easement has been repeatedly included in proposals for a new crosstown subway line in Brooklyn.From the Third Regional Plan's Regional Rx proposal:
A new transit line, the Triboro RX, running essentially perpendicular to the existing radial subway lines, would attract many outer borough transit riders, and by crossing existing lines would provide countless new intra- and inter-borough options. Twenty-three subway lines would be intersected at least once, with six others intersecting twice. Fortunately, most of the right-of-way is already available, in the form of the LIRR Bay Ridge freight line in Brooklyn (mostly 4-tracks wide)...
See also
- Manhattan Beach BranchManhattan Beach BranchThe Manhattan Beach Branch or Manhattan Beach Division was a line of the Long Island Rail Road, running from Fresh Pond, Queens south to Manhattan Beach, Brooklyn, New York City, United States. It opened in 1877 and 1878 as the main line of the New York and Manhattan Beach Railway...